ECONOMIC & POLITICAL Debate: I wish to further justify that Malaysia will be a fully Developed Country, rather than a failed & bankrupted country as propagated by some politically desperate people. Many people behind DAP & PKR have tried to magnify the amount of national & 1MDB debts as a political strategy. I wish to correct their perception because debts can be paid off easily by selling the assets. If you buy assets, then you may have to incur debts. I’m speaking in the interest of the nation without being a member of any political party. Of course, I want Malaysia to be a great country that will benefit all or most of the people.
Today, I’m responding to Prof of Economics (Jomo Sundaram) as per the article in Malaysiakini on 17/10/2017. Someone introduced him as a former professor & an official of the UN in charge of economic development. For sure USA, Europe & Japan don’t need his advice. The countries that needed him most were the under-developed & developing countries. He said a lot about Sri Lanka & Africa (before) in his arguments on ECRL, in which he has equated Malaysia with them. I know that Jomo is a close friend of Prof Syed Husin Ali, but remains a non-partisan person. Anyway, it’s better to look at his arguments rather than his job. Jomo’s idea on the M'sian economy is good only for the checks & balances.
Jomo has said that it’s more difficult to become a Developed Country rather than just a High-Income Country. He is correct. There are about 80 high-income countries today, but there are about 35 developed countries only. Anyway, a high-income or a developed country has a very high GDP Per Capita & HDI index. In both cases, HDI must be 80% or more. Thus, Malaysia needs to score 80% for HDI in order to become a fully Developed Country. A Developed Country is automatically a High-Income Country, but not the reverse case. See Table 3 below for their differences (in the OIC region). Observe that KL & Selangor constitute a fully developed region in Malaysia. Some Islamic countries are already high-income, but they are not industrialized, due to the absence of industrial technology. The latest figure for 2015 shows that Malaysia’s HDI was 78.9% already. A few more years can close this gap of 1.1% only. Of course, the level of industrialization and R&D need to be mobilized in order to become fully developed.
In the OIC region, only Malaysia & Turkey are the most likely ones to become fully developed. Talking about OIC & Islam, it’s good for PAS & Islamic NGO’s (including Ulama) to get involved. Regretfully, the Ulama group is not knowledgeable & not vocal enough to place Malaysia at the top spot in the Islamic World. By right, the PAS group can put pressure on the UMNO group in putting Malaysia as a front country for the New Islamic Civilization. I don’t mean to create the Taliban type of Islam. We need the Universal (International) type of Islam. With so many high-income countries of OIC already there, they can be progressively upgraded to become fully developed – along with Malaysia & Turkey.
Jomo has expressed concern about Malaysia having too many cheap foreign workers & about disindustrialization. Well, cheap foreign workers are good to move the economy quickly. Just remember that Singapore infrastructure was originally built by cheap Malay labourers from Kelantan, because there was no Chinese Singaporeans willing to work there. Well, Singapore & Hong Kong too don’t have much factories. Britain tried to close down factories in the 1990’s, but reversed it again thereafter. Malaysia is still industrializing with high-tech factories, in order to promote higher salaries for the workers. Low-tech factories have moved out to Cambodia, Vietnam, Indonesia, etc. Low-tech factories can still be set-up here by using cheap foreign workers. Thus, Malaysia can become an industrialized country faster by following this approach, provided that R&D is done aggressively from now.
Finally, Jomo advised the government to bring together all the people (including political parties) to discuss economic development. This is a naive idea, because DAP & PKR fellows are never honest in politics. They oppose BR1M, ECRL, Highways, GST, etc. Indeed, they like to propose “Trojan Horses” to bring down the sitting government. Therefore, Jomo’s idea is naive here. I would prefer the PAS group to team-up with UMNO to further increase Islamic credibility in the country. UMNO can provide 2-third, while PAS & Ulama provides another 2-third. Total equals to more than 1. Being together, their own weakness can be overcome. With Anwar being hijacked by DAP, the remaining hope for Islam in Malaysia may come from the PAS group.
Table 2 (below) shows the position of Malaysia among the top countries in Asia. Brunei is just a High-Income (but not a fully Developed) Country. Malaysia is going to be both high-income & fully developed like the former Asian Tigers, Japan & Israel. Meanwhile, our KL Metro has already become a fully developed region with more than 8.2 million people. That is economically better than Israel. Thus, KL Metro alone can counter Israel & the Zionist conspiracy against the Islamic World. I have shown Table 1 (before). I’m giving this table again to reassure that Malaysia is a very prospective nation as the next fully Developed Country.
As usual, fellow friends are welcome to give your comments, suggestions & criticisms. Debates are welcome. Academic arguments are most welcome. Your beliefs are also welcome.
